The demonstrations of the Arab Spring are driven in large part by the enormous increase in the price of wheat caused by world wide decreases in the amount of wheat coming to market due to drought and government decisions, like the insane decision by the US government, at the behest of the Kansas Agribusiness giant Archer Daniels Midland and the environmental lobby, to turn corn into gasoline, thereby causing much land that would have been planted in wheat to be planted in corn. And so poor people world wide, and not just in Arab lands, are deprived of bread, their principal source of food.

 

.

If price of wheat now goes sky high

And bread that Arabs make

Now costs so much then they should try

To eat more chocolate cake

Or mayhap try a nice gateau

A cupcake would be nice

A jellyroll or just for show

A strudel filled with spice

It breaks my heart to hear them cry

And tears from me are wrung

To see they can no longer fry

Ataif cakes over dung

 

Ataif are small yeast pancakes dipped in orange blossom syrup and served with clotted cream and garnished with chopped pistachios. Sounds good, just don’t let them fall into the dung fire.

 

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